Samsung's 17-inch R700 laptop comes to light

Looks like Samsung has gone and whipped up a 17-inch laptop of its own to appease the multimedia lovers out there, but for folks lookin' to get their game on, we doubt you'll find much to love here. The 7-pound R700 sports an all-black motif that's oh-so-Samsung, and features a 1,440 x 900 resolution panel, NVIDIA's GeForce 8400 GS, a 1.3-megapixel webcam, dual-layer DVD burner, built-in HDMI port, gigabit Ethernet, 802.11a/b/g, Bluetooth 2.0 and a 7-in-1 multicard reader to handle all your flash cards. Oddly enough, we're not told what type(s) of processors will be available here, but we do know the machine will come stocked with Windows Vista Home Premium when it hits the market in February for around $970.

[Via Laptops Blog]

[m @ Dec 20th 2007 9:41AM]

sounds like a desktop replacement that you will outgrow in a year.

[Tony C @ Dec 20th 2007 9:42AM]

Looks very ThinkPad-ish... Nicely uncluttered design, good weight and price too! Hopefully the thickness matches the weight, hard to tell from that angle with the beveled edges. The antimicrobial keyboard is an interesting touch, I'll bet we see that in a lot more keyboards in the future. But they better have upgrades, because that panel resolution is abysmal for 17"! A shiny 1900x1200 would be much appreciated.

BTW... Why the hell is the press release sourced and translated from an Uzbekistanian Samsung website? O.o

[BatteryAcid @ Dec 20th 2007 9:43AM]

Wow that looks thin, simple, and powerful. Plus an HDMI port.

[Tony C @ Dec 20th 2007 9:54AM]

Pocket Lint (http://www.pocket-lint.co.uk/news/news.phtml/11817/12841/slimline-laptop-launch-samsung-R700.phtml) says that it's the "latest Centrino Duo processor" -- I'd assume they mean Core 2 Duo with Penryn, since the 15.4" versions (http://www.samsung.com/he/products/notebookcomputer/r_series/np_r70.asp) of this notebook already uses that technology.

[Randy @ Dec 20th 2007 10:00AM]

Too large. If they would make one w/ these specs and a 14 or 15 inch screen then I'd probably bite. The T43p is still my favorite laptop.

[Tony C @ Dec 20th 2007 10:52AM]

Samsung makes a smaller version, it's just not available in the US. See my above post for the linkage. Maybe Dell will relabel it as another Latitude X-series notebook and call it their own?

[jordan @ Dec 20th 2007 10:20AM]

i don't like that they're using a naming scheme that parallel's ATI's chipset numbers. especially when they've got nvidia cards in them :)

[Philippe @ Dec 20th 2007 10:39AM]

Why such a big 1,440 x 900 resolution? I thought people loved big screen with low resolution.

[Tony C @ Dec 20th 2007 10:55AM]

I'm confused... 1440x900 is a pretty pitiful for a 17" notebook LCD, that number of pixels is usually reserved for 14"-15.4" panels... are you saying you want lower resolution or higher? Personally at that screen-inchage, I'd want it to be 1900x1200! =)

[Philippe @ Dec 20th 2007 11:22AM]

Sarcasm, of course ;-)

[wickedpheonix @ Dec 20th 2007 11:11AM]

Nice. 7 pounds on a 17" is pretty nice, along with the all-black motif and such. Considering the price, I can't complain, but a higher-res screen for HD movies would be the kicker for a lot of people.

Now just get a significant retail prescence and Sammy is all set XD

[Kevin @ Dec 20th 2007 1:09PM]

Weird, Samsung's Korean rival LG also makes a 17" R700 Media Laptop:
http://ca.lge.com/en/products/category/list/r700expressdualseries.jhtml

[Mark @ Dec 20th 2007 9:12PM]

I think Samsung has really taken a step backwards with its recent line of laptops. These new black ones are thicker and heavier than the previous models (the ones that were in silver). This R700 doesn't really appeal to anyone. It has the specs of a 13/14 inch laptop in the case of a 17 inch. The only reason anyone would buy a 17inch is for gaming/multimedia and this just doesn't seem to cut it with the weak 8400gs graphics and low res screen (for a 17in).

[Mark @ Dec 20th 2007 9:14PM]

The R70 doesnt use penryn. Its just santa rosa

[frank @ Dec 21st 2007 11:53AM]

Am I missing something or did they start selling laptops in the US and not tell anyone?

[Apoco-Lips @ Dec 22nd 2007 12:14PM]

Crysis on High @ 1,440 x 900 @ 1.4 FPS ?